Yesterday, I had two very different classes of Spanish 2. One class refused to engage and participate while learning Spanish, whereas the other class embraced the methods of learning in Spanish (not translating nor asking for a translation), helping each other understand the concepts, and falling over themselves to be next to participate. I was totally impressed by their eagerness, as it has been, at times, a challenge to engage them in learning Spanish.
Yesterday, however, we flipped the script by using Class Dojo, a free app I downloaded to my iPad and iPhone. I heard of Class Dojo from Susan Satar, a Spanish teacher at another high school in our district, who has used Class Dojo to track positive (and negative behaviors) in classes of 35 students. Since she swore by it, I loaded my class roster, quickly checked attendance, and it was incredibly easy to track each student's progress throughout the class by checking off some pre-selected categories for positive work! There are also categories to track a student's negative behaviors, but using Class Dojo helped me focus on my students' positive behaviors, thereby encouraging them to do more. The more I encouraged, the more they participated, and the cycle continued until we were helping each other in Spanish 100% of the time!
I'm so glad Ms. Satar introduced me to Class Dojo, and I'm looking forward to having another tool to encourage and reward my students for learning and speaking in Spanish!
Yesterday, however, we flipped the script by using Class Dojo, a free app I downloaded to my iPad and iPhone. I heard of Class Dojo from Susan Satar, a Spanish teacher at another high school in our district, who has used Class Dojo to track positive (and negative behaviors) in classes of 35 students. Since she swore by it, I loaded my class roster, quickly checked attendance, and it was incredibly easy to track each student's progress throughout the class by checking off some pre-selected categories for positive work! There are also categories to track a student's negative behaviors, but using Class Dojo helped me focus on my students' positive behaviors, thereby encouraging them to do more. The more I encouraged, the more they participated, and the cycle continued until we were helping each other in Spanish 100% of the time!
I'm so glad Ms. Satar introduced me to Class Dojo, and I'm looking forward to having another tool to encourage and reward my students for learning and speaking in Spanish!